A Little Yin and Yang in the Land of High Passes

It’s been over a year since I last reflected and put my thoughts down on paper, or rather, imaginary paper on the internet. Finally, after more than twelve months of mental constipation, the weight of my collective experiences has forced my hands. A great deal transpired over the previous year, good and bad of course, but I don’t really feel like reflecting upon it now…maybe I will later, otherwise you will just have to wait for my autobiography (I already have several titles in mind). But, onto the present! For starters, I’m once more in Ladakh. For those counting, this is my fourth journey to this trans-Himalayan cold desert. Though the mountains high above, jagged and glistening white, seem static, immovable, unchanging, the valleys and settlements are in constant flux, as dynamic as the melting glaciers. This change, though it is the way of the world, is not all good. With the increase in access to information, medical care, and opportunity has come more tourists (not necessarily a bad thing), more trash, the throw-away mentality of mass-produced consumerist society, more vehicles, more drunkenness, and more pollution. And as the water channels running through the streets become ever more choked with discarded wrappers and empty plastic bottles there is less and less of what makes Ladakh such a wonderful and unique place. Less respect for religion and culture (a growing phenomenon among the local population), less sustainability, less village life, less farming, less respect and compassion. But who am I to begrudge the Ladakhis (or anyone else for that matter) the amenities and comforts I take for granted everyday back in America. Who am I to deny these people a satellite TV and a compact car, a washing machine and an electric stove? Though it makes for a depressing realization, the dream of the developing world is not democracy or the high-minded ideals of liberal Western intellectuals, no matter how much we might spout off about it. The dream of the developing world is an easier life, one with a certain degree of material comfort. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not advocating the Ladakhis get rid of their cars and television sets and return to eking out a meager existence in the narrow valleys and arid pastures beneath the lifeless peaks. I have no good answers, no solutions to the curse of development. All I can really do is pose the following question in the hopes that someone more driven and capable and intelligent than I will be pushed to do something, if there is indeed anything that can possibly be done, and this question, actually questions, are as follows: was human life ever meant to be so comfortable, and as we seek to further insulate ourselves from the unpleasantness of the world around us, do we not block out something else? Something perhaps necessary to our existential wellbeing? Surely, as we immerse ourselves in decadence and lessen the hardships we face, something is abandoned, forgotten; a timeless element of our existence—let’s just call it calloused hands—by which I mean struggle and challenge and discomfort having a demonstrable, subtly positive effect on human life. Am I onto something…you be the judge.

                But that’s enough brooding for today. Rather, I’ll end with a little story from my morning hike. I was skirting the eastern edge of Leh, taking a purposely long and out of the way route on the way back into town. On the left side of the road was a little puppy, sleeping peacefully, or so I thought. As I drew closer, something was clearly amiss. A great many flies buzzed about, but the little pup did not move, its abdomen bloated, but terribly still. And so, a brutal realization dawned. This little puppy, having only recently come into the world, was dead. Its innocent spirit again being forced to navigate the crucible of the bardos, the liminalities all beings must traverse as they journey from one life to the next. I took out my headphones, uttered a few mantras, and made a quick prayer for the puppy to be reborn in a pureland, a dimension of no suffering in which enlightenment is easily attained in one lifetime. Nothing tears at me here quite like the suffering of dogs. Indeed, the first time I cried in India was after seeing a mangy, emaciated dog in New Delhi vomit up nothing but bile from its empty stomach, which other starving dogs proceeded to lick up. Brutal, right? Anyways, back to the story at hand. Having been vividly reminded of the Buddha’s First Noble Truth that all life is suffering, I continued with my hike, albeit, now a little distraught. It was not long before another dog, this one full grown, came trotting over a low rock wall, with, much to the benefit of my inner wellbeing, a little up in tow, this one very much alive. Judging by the size and colouring of this spritely pup, it was more than likely the sibling of the dead puppy lying some twenty meters behind me. And so, I was reminded of another eternal truth: the cruelness of existence is matched only by its beauty. For darkness and light exist side by side, complimenting and completing one another. As the Daoists would say, the Way, or Dao, is composed of both yin and yang. One without the other and the whole world would be but chaos. Harmony is balance, and so, for a few fleeting moments this morning, my world was harmonious. And that, dear friends, is as clean of an ending to a story you are ever going to get, from me, at least.

The Frequency is Courage,

-Doug B.

P.S. I would link unfamiliar terms for your convenience, but the internet is too slow for that to work at the moment.

A Swan Song For a Dear Dog

My dog is dead, so is my beard. So it goes. On the other side of this Earth, I am not sure what to feel. My parents say she passed, with dignity and grace. Natural. Peaceful. I cannot, nor will I ask for more of the situation. A painless death, the last parting gift of this life to man's best friend. To my best friend. Now the tears begin. It probably doesn't help that I am listening to "Pathétique" by good ol' L.V. Beethoven or a slew of other songs from a playlist I've made called 'Everybody Hurts,' a la the song of the same name by R.E.M. Jessie, my dog, passed from this life, by reckoning of the Gregorian calender, last Thursday, Fourteen June, Two-Thousand and Twelve, of the Common Era. I did not find out until the evening of Saturday, Sixteen June, Two-Thousand and Twelve, of the Common Era. There are no ill feelings over the discrepancy. Here in what I like to call the 'Wild West,' by which I mean Ladakh, I am quite hard to get a hold of through any medium short of a physical conversation. There is not much more to say. My father has written a eulogy for Jessie, and in good old copycat fashion, so have I.

Here is my father's eulogy:

Jessie Bernstein has gone, we trust to a better place. Jessie was our dog. My dog. That “my” is a miracle. I was raised to fear dogs. Jessie changed all that.

Before I met Jessie, I thought that she would be our kids’ dog. I thought our loving children had guilted me into getting a “rescue” dog while I was away in NYC on lawyer business. So wrong. I loved her at first sight. She looked like Lassie. She was noble and gentle, kind and considerate, funny and sometimes (and endearingly) a little nuts.

Jessie was our good shepherd. Literally. She loved to herd us. Indeed, when Terese came home from out-patient surgery, Jessie climbed the stairs and the bed, and watched over Terese in Jessie’s familiar lioness stance. Terese and Jessie always had the bond of mother and child, but on that day, Jessie was the mother. She healed Terese that day. And on all days, through hugs, laughter, and frolic, she healed our kids.

She healed me too. In so many ways, my (incomplete) journey from fear to wellness began with Jessie. Now, I smile at every dog I see.

Thank you, Jessie. Rest easy. Rebekah and Doug will be Mom’s good shepherds now. You taught them well about unconditional love, as you taught me.

Jessie, you live in our hearts now and forever.

Amen.

Love, Dad

Here is my own, I have tried my best to make it an ecumenical, rather than Buddhist diatribe:

Death is not an end, nor has it ever been.

Just as the sun vanishes below the horizon, to illumine the world still in darkness,
Death is not the end of life, but its rekindling elsewhere.

That light, be it the sun or the departed soul of one most dear, is not gone.
It has merely disappeared from view, below the horizon, where the warmth of its radiance shall stir life anew.

Though coldest darkness may fill the void left in our hearts, such darkness always yields to purifying light.
This purifying light, the pulse of all life, the unbridled luminosity of the soul, is the gift of creation to all beings.

Though life is transformed, it is never extinguished.


Death is not the end, nor has it ever been.

Just as the setting of every sun portends a new sunrise,
The passing of this life, augurs the beginning of the next.

As we are consumed by sadness, it may seem that we are cursed,
Forever more, estranged from the light of our dearly departed; but this is not the case.

Death is not the end, nor has it ever been.

Be it in this life or the next, the familiar glow of those thought forever lost, shall be known once more.
In this reunion, as sure as the rising and setting of the sun, a chorus of souls rejoined, will resound.
In their luminous symphony, tears of sadness shall give way to tears of unbridled light;
The sun itself, if only for an instant, yielding in humility to such resplendence.

 Death is not the end, nor will it ever be.

To Jessie: We'll meet again, don't know where, don't know when,
-Doug B.